


of flesh and forgiveness

by ineedbetterhobbies



Category: InuYasha - A Feudal Fairy Tale
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, BAMF Higurashi Kagome, Beauty and the Beast Elements, Burns, Dark, Depression, Disfigurement, Eventual Romance, F/M, Graphic Description of Corpses, Mental Anguish, Minor Injuries to Child Character, Paternal Sesshoumaru, Post-Canon, Short Chapters, Temporary Character Death
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-16
Updated: 2021-01-16
Packaged: 2021-03-13 17:34:08
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 879
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28782042
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ineedbetterhobbies/pseuds/ineedbetterhobbies
Summary: Kagome thought she had known pain.She had been foolish in her naivety, in her teenage insistence and rebellion.She thought herself nearly untouchable, after years of enduring the Feudal Era.  She never thought she’d find more of Hell on earth, than in the underworld creatures she mingled with.In the wake of tragedy, bonds are broken and new ones form, with the shifting of the seasons.
Relationships: Higurashi Kagome/InuYasha, Higurashi Kagome/Sesshoumaru, Miroku/Sango (InuYasha)
Kudos: 19





	of flesh and forgiveness

**Author's Note:**

> On a bare branch  
> crows have settled-  
> autumn sunset.
> 
> -Basho (1644-1694)

Kagome thought she had known pain.

She had been foolish in her naivety, in her teenage insistence and rebellion. She thought herself nearly untouchable, after years of enduring the Feudal Era. In all the fights and skirmishes, with Naraku and others, she thought she had come to know the worst of the damage that can be done to a body, to a soul. She had bled and spat and fought in battles with a protective ferocity that made her teammates wide-eyed at times, no matter how little damage she had managed. Yet she always had emerged successful.

Kagome had experience in the otherworldly, in the goings on between worlds and the creatures that inhabited the fringes. She had known what to anticipate, what to expect the Fates to throw to her and her found family. Or so the young priestess had thought.

She never thought she’d find more of Hell on earth, than in the underworld creatures she mingled with.

It had started, as it usually does, with a dry season.

Autumn had emerged, unfurling into the lush green foliage with riots of color. The wet, green hiss of summer had been subsumed, drying into the tight new skin of fall.

The winds had picked up, and the rains receded. Droughts emerged, and with it, the drying of the earth like stripped bone. On an evening in September, one strike of lightning, organic, and without purpose, hit a rice crop on the outskirts of the village. With it, came the breath of a dragon.

The world around her was in flames. The fires hadn’t stopped, and only grew with the coaxing of the winds. An old chemistry lesson rose in Kagome’s mind, unbidden, as she saw nothing but red and blackened structures. When oxygen is supplied to fire, the process of combustion is supported, feeding the flames.

The meager wooden structures, and stockpiles of crops, were also food to the inferno, and Kagome knew.

She _knew_ the village was lost. 

Screams emerged, and the smell of burning flesh and hair permeated all her senses. She ran, sandals abandoned, as she drove survivors out of their homes, away from the encroaching wall of flame. She handed children off to Sango and Kohaku, who flew overhead with Kirara and Shippo, transporting out who they could. They were stretched thin, over the rolling miles of the village. Some fought, but most fled, at her begging.

She wondered, then, what did she appear like? Garbed in her singed red hakama, and white kosode, and haloed with the light of hellfire, did she seem holy, and powerful in her desperate demands for them to flee? Did they think of more capable priestesses?

She ran, ripping the Robe of the Fire rat from Inuyasha, defying his distant calls. She had barred him from following, with a paralyzing wave of reiki. His eyes had been filled with fear.

The garment trailed behind her, like a flag waving goodbye. She ran away from them, back into the maw of the fires, as she had seen two missing from the groups that had been evacuated.

She prayed silently, as she made her way back into the thick of it. Into the belly of the beast. Flames licked at her feet, and her lungs felt like they were being fried. But still, she called. She called for the ones who were missing. Both stubborn, but both deserving all the same.

 _“Rin! Kaede!_ ” She screamed, blood and smoke thick in her throat.

She knew, if Kaede hadn’t made it out, Rin wouldn’t leave her side. No matter what. In the roar of the flames, Kagome heard a yelp, like a dying pup. She burst through the sagging opening of their hut. A wayward beam had pinned the older woman to the dirt floor, and a sobbing Rin was pulling desperately at a red sleeve.

Kaede was dead, or soon to be. But the girl, the older priestess’ child, screamed with living lungs. Kagome tugged Rin away from the dead priestess, and the girl fought, scratching, and biting like a wild animal trying get back to her maternal figure.

“Rin, she’s gone! There’s nothing we can do! _We must go, now!_ ”

Rin howled, screaming for Kaede, for Lord Sesshoumaru to rescue her, for anybody to rescue her. The flames grew closer. But nobody living remained in the collapsing village, save for Kagome and Rin. The demon lord would not save them. Nor would Kagome's own half-demon. She had made sure of that. 

Her own family was hopefully miles away by now. Kagome scooped up Rin, holding onto her tight. Kagome’s eyes were wild, searching for an exit, as she smothered Rin into the firerat. She could hear the girl's tiny heartbeat, frantic. A sound she wanted to preserve.

A groan of wood sounded, and the remaining roof above them collapsed. Kagome threw herself to the ground, body stretched over the squirming girl as the debris and flames showered down around them.

Her body curled over Rin protectively, as her flesh and hair curled away, as her clothes melted into her bone. The flames chewed at the firerat, but did not break through its fabric. Kagome wished, with a last breath, to give her life for Rin’s survival.

_Please forgive me, Inuyasha._


End file.
